Illinois posted the third-highest state total of homes receiving foreclosure filings last month, RealtyTrac's latest report shows.Filings were reported on 19,946 properties--the highest monthly total for Illinois since January 2005 and up 57 percent from a year earlier and up 56 percent from September. One in every 263 homes in Illinois received a filing.
The total number of filings was exceeded only by California and Florida.
Filings were reported on 11,494 homes in Cook County, where the number jumped 67 percent from a year earlier and spiked 131 percent from September.
In the Chicago metropolitan area, filings were reported on 18,541 properties, up 63 percent from a year earlier and up 72 percent from September.
High-risk mortgages, negative equity and high unemployment are the driving forces behind foreclosures, according to RealtyTrac Chief Executive Officer James Saccacio.
The unemployment rate hit 10.5 percent in Illinois in September. October figures won't be released until next week. Nationally, the rate hit 10.2 percent last month.
The Woodstock Institute reported last week foreclosure filings in the six-county Chicago region jumped 67 percent in the third quarter from the second quarter, and rose a smaller 18 percent from the third quarter of 2008. The report showed filings dropped 4.6 percent in Cook County in the third quarter from a year earlier.
Nationally, the RealtyTrac report revealed there were foreclosure filings made on 332,292 properties last month, a jump from nearly 19 percent a year earlier, but down 3 percent from September.